Cornucopia of vegetables, herbs grows in Ninth Ward back yard

When Calvin Alexander parks in front of his home on Caffin Avenue, Helen comes running. Helen is a blond hen, one of about 20 that lay eggs for Alexander’s booth at the Sankofa Farmer’s Market on St. Claude Avenue.

View full sizeChris Granger / The Times-PicayuneCalvin Alexander sells fresh herbs, eggs, vegetables and more at the Sankofa Farmers Market on Saturday. It's all grown nearby in the Lower Ninth Ward.

With his salt-and-pepper beard and salesman’s manner, Alexander, 60, is a fixture at the Upper Ninth Ward market every Saturday, peddling not just fresh eggs but also vegetables, herbs and half a dozen varieties of fiery pepper plants, all grown right in the neighborhood.

Alexander and his wife, Natalie, squeeze the most out of every corner of their back yard, plus the patch of ground at a rental they own and a couple of rows at a local community garden.

“All total, I probably have about 50 by 60 feet,” Alexander said. “That’s not even a quarter of an acre.”

Alexander started earning his backyard green thumb when he was 6 years old, living in Memphis.

“My granddad was a master farmer,” he said. “He was great with animals, as well as agriculture. And my mom and dad had a garden. We had about half an acre. We had peaches, figs, tomatoes, cucumbers, watermelons, okra, all sorts of green vegetables, carrots, potatoes and peanuts.”

There were also chickens, ducks and geese. “And we had dozens of pigs.”

His grandmother ran a corner store where they sold their produce. Outside the door, young Calvin had his first lessons in business, selling snowballs and candied apples.

“I’ve always been a people person,” he said.

He went on to become a telecommunications technician and manager with AT&T, then a licensed real estate agent. He and his wife raised four daughters and a son. After he retired, they began selling fresh basil, sage and rosemary along with home-grown greens and vegetables at the farmer’s market.

He’s a devotee of small-scale sustainable farming practices, collecting rainwater from the roof of his house to water the crops and picking up used coffee grounds from a coffee shop to add nutrients to his rich compost. Plants sprout from every nook and cranny in the yard, in recycled buckets, baskets and tubs.

He’s confident that more people could trim their grocery budgets by planting small gardens.

“When you understand the concept of how many plants you can work with in a limited area, you can at least feed your family,” he said.

Rashida Ferdinand, founder and executive director of the Sankofa Community Development Corp., said the Alexanders — along with their grown daughters and grandchildren, who often help at the booth — are good ambassadors for the small but growing market, which opened in 2010.

“They’re local businesspeople,” she said. “We consider our vendors to be businesspeople. A lot of people know Calvin and come for the booth. He’s been really active and engaged in supporting development in this community. So we have people who live in the city and are choosing to share the foods that they grow with the community. And of course, they’re making some money off this as well.”

The market moved a month ago from the Academy of the Holy Angels to the location on St. Claude, in front of ARISE Academy.

Sankofa brings healthful, local food to the Ninth Ward, which is cut off geographically from the rest of the city and has a high proportion of poor residents who lack transportation to supermarkets, Ferdinand said.

Alexander enjoys introducing residents to farm-fresh produce grown just blocks from where they live.

“Many people have never tasted a fresh chicken egg,” he said. “When they do, they can tell the difference.”

On Saturday, he offered advice along with herbs and peppers to a steady stream of regular customers as one of his daughters, Katrina Alexander, kept him company nearby.

“The interest I see in the customers who are looking for fresh and locally provided produce is really exciting to me,” Calvin Alexander said. “And I have met a lot of nice people.”

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The Sankofa Farmers Market is open Saturdays from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. at 3819 St. Claude Ave. Vendors offer preserves, herbs, vegetables, fruit and bread. There are cooking demonstrations, music and children’s activities as well. For more information, go to sankofanola.org.

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Annette Sisco is community news editor. She can be reached at 504.826.3310.